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Bush Vetoes Children’s Health Bill

WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 — President Bush vetoed the children’s health insurance bill today, as he had promised to do, setting the stage for more negotiations between the White House and Congress and sparking unusual dismay from some prominent Republicans.

Mr. Bush wielded his pen with no fanfare just before leaving for a visit to Lancaster, Pa. The veto was only the fourth of Mr. Bush’s presidency, and it may have spawned the most anger, not just from Democrats but also from some members of Mr. Bush’s own party.

“Because the Congress has chosen to send me a bill that moves our health care system in the wrong direction, I must veto it,” Mr. Bush said in his veto statement, adding that he hoped to work with the lawmakers “to produce a good bill that puts poorer children first.”

The bill was approved by Congress with unusual bipartisan support, as many Republicans who side with the president on almost everything else voted to expand the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, or Schip, from its current enrollment of about 6.6 million children to more than 10 million.

The measure would provide $60 billion over the next five years, $35 billion more than current spending and $30 billion more than the president proposed. Mr. Bush and his backers argue that the bill would be a step toward federalization of health care, and that it would steer the program away from its core purpose of providing insurance for poor children and toward covering children from middle-class families. The program was to expire on Sept. 30 but financing for it has been continued through a stopgap spending bill that will be in effect through mid-November.

The White House has rejected as “preposterous” any suggestion that Mr. Bush does not care about the welfare of poor children. But the reaction of some Republicans as well as Democrats was so heated that at least one lawmaker who is usually allied with the president promised to try to corral votes to defeat his veto.

In a midday appearance before the Lancaster Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Mr. Bush expanded on his reasons for vetoing the bill. “It is estimated that if this program were to become law, one out of every three persons that would subscribe to the new expanded Schip would leave private insurance,” the president said. “The policies of the government ought to be to help poor children and to focus on poor children, and the policies of the government ought to be to help people find private insurance, not federal coverage. And that’s where the philosophical divide comes in.”

But the philosophical divide is not just between Republicans and Democrats, as the reaction of some Republicans demonstrated.

“Unfortunately, I believe that some have given the president bad advice on this matter,” said Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Republican of Utah. He said supporting the health bill “is the morally right thing to do,” and that he hoped Mr. Bush’s veto could be overridden.

Another Republican, Senator Gordon Smith of Oregon, expressed similar sentiments and called Mr. Bush’s decision “an irresponsible use of the veto pen.”

Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, said that contrary to what Mr. Bush says about his own vision for the insurance plan, “It won’t even cover kids on the program today, much less reach out to cover more kids.”

Photo

President Bush made an appearance in Lancaster, Pa., after issuing his fourth veto, of the childrens health insurance bill.Credit
Saul Loeb/AFP-Getty Images

In an attempt to defeat the veto, Mr. Grassley said he would try to persuade some House members who voted against the insurance bill to switch their positions. There is already enough support in the Senate to override the veto, so the main battleground will be in the House of Representatives, which is expected to vote on an override measure in about two weeks.

And Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, Republican of Texas, said there were “valid concerns about expanding Schip,” but that Mr. Bush should “sit down with Congress so that we can continue the Schip program within the scope of its original mission.”

As expected, the veto brought immediate statements of anger from Democrats.

“Today we learned that the same president who is willing to throw away a half trillion dollars in Iraq is unwilling to spend a small fraction of that amount to bring health care to American children,” said Senator Edward M. Kennedy, the chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

Mr. Kennedy’s fellow Democrat from Massachusetts and Mr. Bush’s 2004 opponent, Senator John Kerry, said, “Today with a single stroke of his veto pen, President Bush single-handedly jeopardized health care for millions of poor children.”

Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, said the “heartless veto” showed how “detached President Bush is from the priorities of the American people.”

Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, said, “Today the president showed the nation his true priorities: $700 billion for a war in Iraq, but no health care for low-income kids.”

Gov. Jon Corzine of New Jersey said: “Once again, President Bush has missed an opportunity to display compassionate leadership. Instead, he has resorted to political and ideological gamesmanship rather than seek a bipartisan solution that would protect this nation’s most vulnerable children.”

Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, said: “We have no choice but to try to override his veto. The Senate already has the votes to do it, so it is now up to the holdouts in the House to decide whether to vote their conscience or join the president in putting ideology above kids.”

Mr. Schumer put his finger on the numbers working against supporters of the bill. It cleared the Senate by a veto-proof 67 to 29, but the vote in the House was 265 to 159, a couple dozen short of the two-thirds needed to override Mr. Bush’s veto, assuming that the full House voted.

Representative Roy Blunt of Missouri, the House Republican whip, told The Associated Press he was “absolutely confident” that there was strong enough opposition in the House to sustain a veto. But Mr. Blunt’s counterpart in the Senate, Trent Lott of Mississippi, said Congress should be able to reach a compromise with the president. “We can work it out,” Mr. Lott told the A.P.

Dana Perino, the White House spokeswoman, said Mr. Bush’s critics had “made their political point.”

“What the president said is, look, send me the bill, I will veto it, and then we will get about the business of trying to find some common ground and reach an agreement on a way forward,” Ms. Perino said.